Remi Adeleke: rethink your heroes

When I was a kid, my mom would take my brother and I to the movies. It was somewhat of a pastime for us to detach from our life and turn to this new world through film for two hours. This movie by the name of Bad Boys came out, which was directed by Michael Bay. That was the first movie I remember seeing where there were two heroes who looked like me and they weren't playing thugs or gangsters or drug dealers but instead they were playing heroes who were essentially running, gunning and saving the day.

A year later Michael Bay's second film The Rock came out, and that was the first time I was exposed to Navy SEALs. I was just blown away by this portrayal of men who were coming out of the water going into this place to go sacrifice themselves to save others. That really resignation with me and I thought if I was to ever turn my life around, that's what I would do.

Ever since I was young I always wanted to control things. When I would want something I would literally, if I had to, I would run through walls to get it. I've always felt like I've needed to be the one to make things happen in my life. And it's hard for me to trust people or to trust something outside of me.

When my father died, I took in any and everything that I felt would satisfy that paternal void, that would teach me how to be a man.

Through culture, music, I was constantly bombarded with this message that said, "You're a young African American male, you need to be a hustler, or you need to be a thug, or you need to be a player." Because I didn't have a positive male role model to tell me otherwise to say "No. This is not what a man is. This is what a man is."

I started out stealing from my mom that progressed to running scams and that progressed to selling drugs. When my father died, I took in any and everything that I felt would satisfy that paternal void, that would teach me how to be a man. One day I was laying in bed and this voice, whatever it was, it was a voice to me but it just kept on pressing upon me that I needed to join the military. I needed to get out of New York and joining the military is what I needed to do.

It's not many jobs out there where you can get paid to you know, jump out of planes and go after bad guys, protect those who couldn’t protect themselves. Essentially be that guy who stood in the face of bullies and said not on my watch.

My acting coach, he trained Stella Adler. Stella Adler was a proponent for actors getting out of their environment and traveling the world, seeing different cultures, tasting different foods, experiencing love, experiencing pain, experiencing all these experiences that life has to offer, and then taking those experiences and cataloging them so that actor is able to pull from those experiences to bring the character to life.

I was at the lowest point I had ever been in my entire life. I literally began to cry out to Jesus. "Help me, Jesus. Help me."

Going to cold weather survival training in Alaska, and while I would walk through this wilderness I really had time to reflect upon myself in the silence because it was completely silent out there. I'd began to think about how I treated my mom and how I treated people I claimed I loved. I would think about things that I did in the past and I still yearned for that paternal presence.

I couldn't really sleep and then I began to have suicidal thoughts. I was at the lowest point I had ever been in my entire life. I didn't know anything about the Bible but by a simple ounce of faith I literally began to cry out to Jesus.

"Help me, Jesus. Help me."

Then I began to surround myself around Christians who didn’t just read the Bible but they actually lived the Bible and I began to pray and all I wanted to do was be with him and do for him and forsake that life I used to live and live this new life with him. My whole life was dramatically changed. I just like I felt God telling me you need to join the military, I felt God pressing upon me the importance of it's time for you to get out of the military, it's time for you to move on, I have something else for you.

I didn't know how I was going to pay the bills. I was expecting to have all these opportunities for speaking engagements because I got into speaking and that didn't happen. The phones didn't ring. I began to get really nervous because I knew that I had only about six months of savings. I have a wife and she's pregnant with our first son. We're just barely scraping through, like we're living paycheck to paycheck.

It just didn't work out the way I expected it, and when it didn't work out I got so frustrated. I got mad at God. It was silence. It was silence.

I had financial problems and then to compound the financial problems we had significant marriage problems. And the marriage problems were so bad we both contemplated getting a divorce. It just didn't work out the way I expected it, and when it didn't work out I got so frustrated. There was a point where I got mad at God. Did I hear you wrong? Was I supposed to get out of the military? Was I supposed to make that decision? It was silence. It was silence.

Around that time, I received a phone call from a lady who I worked with years prior, she cast me in a TV show by the name of The Last Ship back in 2013 for a day of filming.

She said, Well, I've been trying to find you for this movie that starts filming tomorrow."

I was like, "Ok what move is that?"

She said, "Well, its Transformers."

I started out as a day player, two weeks later I was called back for three more weeks of filming. I started to get lines from the director, which was unusual for me because I was like Wow I’m just a background extra.

He said to me, "Hey, the director wants to upgrade you to a principal role, are you available to film for the rest of production?"

And I said, "Absolutely."

I know that his plan is better than any plan that I could ever have, even though his plan may not make sense to me.

The director happened to be Michael Bay. The same one who inspired me to be a SEAL. You know when you look at my story going from the Bronx, to the military, then to special operations out of that in a marriage, being a husband and being a father and then, now having a career in acting in the film industry. There's one word I could sum it up with: God.

And so he's been with me throughout my entire life. He's seen the good, the bad, and the ugly. And he's used it all to bring me to where I'm at today. I don't want to force things anymore. I just want to allow God to do whatever it is that he wants to do in my life.

If he wants to take me out of this acting career next week then so be it. If he wants me to get back into the military, so be it. If he wants me to go into ministry full-time, so be it. If he wants me to take up a job, I don't know, as a pilot or whatever, so be it. Because I know that his plan is better than any plan that I could ever have and even though his plan may not make sense to me. Within his plans is everything that I need and everything that not just good for me but good for my family as well.